The team SABR
by soiejo55
Summary: An AU that takes place 50 years before RWBY. A team of professional hunters must defend the world and uncover the truth about the grimm leaders
1. Chapter 1- a battle under the sun

It was a sunny, hot and dry day, just like yesterday, and the day before, and the day before this one, and pretty much every day in the kingdom of Vacuo. The small nomad village called Bacot was active at the moment, with people on the market, working and planting in their little subsistence farms. The guards were in a small wall around the city, watching. A few weeks earlier the guard job would be a boring one. However, lately there have been some "incidents".

"Scaleback coming by north-west!" said a guard

Coming at alarming speed was a lizard-like black and with scaled monster. It's huge body looked like a komodo dragon's and had the size of a horse. Most of his body was black and white alternating scales, except for his back, which consisted in yellow tough scales. With his razor-like claws and an acid spraying mouth, it was a beast you'd want to never find in your life

"Prepare bows!" said the leader, waiting for the right time. The soldiers drew their bows. "Now!" said the leader

The arrows flew while the bows were released and landed in the grimm's back. Most of them just slid over the powerful scales that gave the reptilian beast its name; however three projectiles hit him right in the forehead and eyes, making the huge lizard die with one final howl.

Then, an unexpected thing happened: after a little time there was a small army of about twelve scalebacks coming in their direction in an arrow-shaped formation. The soldiers then, startled by the sudden big amount, ignored their leader's orders and just panicky shot arrows at the first sight. The warriors only killed about 4 lizards when they got to the wall. They drew their swords knowing that they wouldn't stand a chance against the huge acid-spitting killing machines. The grimm were reaching the top of the wall and were starring at the defenders with their cold, merciless devilish gaze, ready for the final strike…

…just to be interrupted by a silver and black shadow that jumped between the men and the grimm. The mysterious newcomer was a man in his early twenties, about twenty-five or six, which was wearing a black shirt, dark gray pants and over that a black and silver cloak. He looked at the lizards with annoyed and somewhat bored eyes, as if it was a very uninteresting routine. He, then, unsheathed his sword too fast for an ordinary eye to see. His blade was a less curved saber that was very well treated, with the blade sharpened and polished.

With a quick slash he cut through one scaleback's eyes making it howl and fall from the wall. The others noticed, then, that he was the threat there. They focused their attacks on him, trying to bite. However when they got too close, the warrior would slice their faces, particularly preferring the eyes. They tried to attack from a distance, then, spitting acid over him. Yet he just gracefully dodged, jumping to a safe distance. He, strangely, sheathed his sword, just to then unsheathe it again, with some difference: the blade was stuck on the sheath and released from the handle, and instead the handle ended in a gun facing up. It turned 90 degrees down and become a fully working flintlock pistol. He began shooting the giant komodo dragons in the face, especially in their eyes. The last five standing grimm have gone around the lone warrior, trying to surround him. He activates his sword again, but when the scalebacks were coming close the handle of the saber revealed another trick: from the pommel a whole rapier blade extended, the sword turning out to have two blades: one side being a saber and the other being a rapier. He quickly stabbed and thrusted all the lizards around in a steel and claws dance, ending with the corpses of five grimm around him and some cuts and bruises in his skin. The other lizards ran away but died not too far from the wall. The soldiers just stare at the figure, startled by his sudden appearance.

The leader however knew what he was. His fight style was clearly focused against grimm. His weapon was a compact multi fighting tool, or CMFT for short. A type of weapon created at the end of the war that consisted in various weapons build up together. As it was a new technology and was usually expensive and could be buggy, it wasn´t very used by the police or the military, however it was very common by a special class of warrior.

Hunters.

The leader stepped ahead and said "Are you the man we called for the work?"

The hunter smiled and said "Hunter Andrew reporting, sir. I think that after seeing this you won't have to test my capacity to do the job"

 **And that was the first chapter of my first fanfiction: the team saber. This will take place 50 years before the the series; however it's an AU, as it has some different mechanics, especially concerning grimm and semblances. Some notes:**

 **I am not a natural English speaker, so sometimes I will do some grammar mistakes. I will have a lot of care for typos, however I can't promise to have a correct grammar and always use the correct expressions or the correct slangs.**

 **I plan on doing another rwby fanfiction after I end this one. It will happen in the same AU as this one; however it will be in the time of the RWBY team, not 50 years earlier. This one will be like a prequel, and it will explain the new mechanics I mentioned earlier. I will gradually make authors notes like this one explaining them (like the world of remnant episodes).**

 **And finally I just want to thank you for reading this. I will try to post the next chapter tomorrow, if I can.**

 **Follow and leave a comment if you want to see more :)**


	2. Chapter 2- a mercenary's job

Andrew was with the leader, who said to be a specialist called Jorell, in his headquarters, if it could be called like that. The place was a house made of sandstone, wood for lift and some clay as cement. It was somewhat ugly outside, and inside was even worse. Everything was a mess, papers scattered across the floor and some remains of food in the ground. The specialist didn't seem to care.

"You've already seen our situation, mister. Few weeks ago a scaleback nest has been created close to our village. Since then there has been countless attacks, but usually only 2 or 3 grimm. That was the first time we've seen that many and so…" the man thought what word to use "…organized." he said. "Tell me; aren't they supposed to be irrational and fully instinctive beings?"

Andrew thought of this. It should be a pretty simple task. Scalebacks are annoying and sometimes tricky, but not hard. He began to explain "tell me, did you let one scaleback ran away? Like, after you have attacked them?"

The other man didn't understand the purpose of the question but answered: "once, in the beginning. We shot him, but he survived and ran back to the direction the nest must be. But why are you asking?"

Andrew said then "that was a bad move of yours. You are right, grimm are irrational, but only before their first battle. Usually they die then, so they don't give us trouble, however, if a grimm survive his first battle, then it notices that being irrational will end up killing him. That's when he starts learning. It can take hundreds of years for a grimm to be considered a rational, sentient and intelligent being, but I guess a few weeks spying on this village and watching his brothers die was enough to learn a few battle strategies, and teach them to the rest of the nest. However, when they saw an enemy that was stronger than them and knew their weak spots, they panicked, just like your men, and started attacking me without thinking, and that helped me win."

Jorell just stared at Andrew for a few seconds after this extensive explanation. Then he noticed a crucial detail "Weak spots?"

The hunter looked at him with a funny and joyful look. Jorell didn't like it. For him it looked like the hunter was always laughing at his ignorance about grimm hunting. "You are a perceptive man. You must have noticed that I kept striking the beasts at their eyes, right?" the man nodded "behind the eyes there are two large arteries that 'feed' its brain. All those grimm died by brain damage. That is lesson number 1 in hunting grimm: every grimm has a weak spot, you only have to find it, and that's where the stuff gets complicated: finding the weak spot. All the known and common grimm have their weak spots cataloged, but with new species being discovered everyday, chances are that you will find one that is not cataloged, and you may have to discover its weak spot, and that takes time. And believe me, in a battle…" he give a dark glare at the official "…time, or the lack of it, is the thing that kills the most"

The official stayed speechless for a couple more seconds, and right before he would say anything the hunter started again "so where is that nest you said about? I won't need any man escorting me and won't need any provisions. I'll be back at about… " he looked at the clock in the wall "after the sunset" he concluded

Jorell was starting to get annoyed by the man not letting he talk he just quickly said "west-northwest, we don't know the exact position of the nest, but this is the direction the grimm run away" he just barely finished speaking when the hunter got away from the place, and out of the town.

It took about half an hour of walking to spot the construction. It was like a termite mound, but the size of a house. It had an irregular hole that was big enough to pass a car that probably was used as a door. It looked like an easy mission for him, he just had to go in, kill some scalebacks, kill the queen, kill the princess if there is one and go out safely. Without a queen or a princess, the nest will just die. Easy to say, but maybe it would be hard to do. Andrew decided that didn't matter, just run for it.

And so he did.

He ran as fast as he could, picking his pistol in the way. It was a bad strategy, but strategy was never his thing. He was hoping to kill the queen before the nest could react, after all, if he could kill a normal scaleback with one shot, he could kill a queen with one shot, right? A queen couldn't be much different from a normal one, right?

Wow.

It's impressive how he was wrong about that.

When he passed thought the door he noticed that the nest was actually a hole in the ground, and that outside structure was like the tip of the iceberg. Standing in front of him was a massive amount of grimm beasts, about 50 scalebacks. And there was the monstrous queen scaleback: it was like any other, except it was HUGE. Apart from the scales on its back, it also had spikes as tall as his knee. It had very long teeth and a stretching tongue, like a frog, but he could see small thorns, probably venomous.

The queen let out an ear-piercing screech, and the lizards started charging. Andrew had to think fast. He thought of a plan, but it only had a small chance of working. 'Well, let's hope today is my lucky day'. He would have to use his semblance.

He stared at the queen with a fear eye, hoping that she was rational enough to have already learned the concept of fear. She was. She started snarling at him, suddenly seeing him as a danger. The whole nest stopped its attack, confuse about the sudden change of behavior if its leader. Andrew seized this split second and attacked the queen, jumping in its face and stabbing her eye…

Just to discover another one of her natural defenses. When he tried to stab her eye it was stopped by a thick second eyelid. It was transparent, so she could still see him. Now she was trying to attack him with her claws and the other grimm were trying to kill him too. He had no idea of what to do now.

Then he remembered a thing: he could use the dust. He had a small fire dust crystal, about the size of a small dagger. Well, in fact it wasn't a100% fire dust, it was about 97%, but that didn't mattered. All that mattered is that it was enough to do a pretty big explosion. He stuck the crystal between the normal and the inner eyelid of the queen. "let's see if your fancy eye protector can protect THIS" he shouted. He jumps from its head as far as he could and in mid air he shot the crystal. The explosion destroyed the queen's face, and some scalebacks that were close to her trying to catch him. He doesn't suffer many burns, but the energy throws him out of the nest. He, then run away as fast as he can.

When the sun is setting a soldier goes in the room of jorell. "Sir" he says "the hunter is back" he commands to let Andrew in. he sees the he is in no good state, with the face full of small cuts and some burns. However, he was alive, and if he follows the well known hunter vows, this means that the mission was completed. "you did it" he said, more of an affirmation than a question. The hunter nodded. "Well, seems that you will need some medical help. I'll call the doctors"

"This won't be necessary" Andrew replied. "All I want is a hotel or an inn to eat and sleep. The aura can do the rest." The soldier from Vacuo had listened stories about the mystical aura and how the hunters controlled her so well, but never saw it in real life.

The next day Andrew was going to Vacuo to see if he could find a new mission; afar all that is what he does in life. He is a hunter, a monster slayer, a freelancer, a legally approved mercenary.

It was when he received a message in his communicator, or scroll as they were called. It was a new technology, still only able to send and receive messages. The message was the following: uniting the team. Big and hard mission. Vale, one week from now. And it only had an S as signature.

Andrew stared at the message. The group only united at REALLY tough missions, or when their leader was too lazy to do a job alone. But that wasn't what surprised him. "Hard mission". Their leader NEVER finds anything hard. Everything is like child's play for him. And if somebody like him defines something as hard

That's a thing Andrew would never miss. 'To vale we go' he thought.

 **And that was the second chapter, folks (in the following day, as promised)! Some notes about it**

 **That was a first introduction about the character Andrew. There will be now introductions about the other members of the group**

 **I am trying to do bigger chapters and improve my writing, especially about fight scenes. You have probably noticed that my fight scenes are still too fast and without too much action. If you have any suggestions about this or any other thing, please write a review or PM me.**

 **Now the story is rated M, but I will probably change to T in the future. I only rated M because of safety, as I wasn't very familiar with the rating system and I didn't knew if this story would be too violent, or have much swearing, so I drop an M just to be sure.**

 **Now, as I said, I will do a bit of lore explaining at the end of each chapter. This time with aura and the new semblance system**

 **Aura can be used as a "force field", like in the series, and also to heal wounds faster. However it tires the user very quickly.**

 **You already know what's a semblance (for those who don't it's an special power of aura users and every person has a different one, for example: ruby can run very fast, Blake can create shadow clones and if that wasn't clear, Andrew's semblance is like an emotional stare: he can inflict fear at his enemies or comfort people or convince them to do as he like, just using his stare.) but there are two things that I created: the countenance and the mega-semblance. The countenance is like an alternative semblance, with one major difference: while the semblance consumes aura and cam be combined with dust, the countenance consumes dust and can be combined with aura to become stronger. The mega semblance is basically a super strong version of the semblance, and only very strong aura users can do it. If you watch bleach, you can compare the semblance/mega-semblance relationship with the shikai/bankai relationship.**

 **And that's all for this chapter! Again, if you have a suggestion/constructive critic, write a review or PM me.**

 **TILL NEXT CHAPTER :)**


	3. Chapter 3- gangs and grimm

Mistral. The least safe and most criminalized kingdom in all world of remnant. Under their swamps horrible grimm beasts were lurking. Above their swamps even worse humans were planning some nasty crime against the poor farmers that had the bad luck of being born in a place like that, like wolfs hunting small lambs.

In short, it was the best place for a hunter get a job.

Blaine was heading towards a pub in the middle of a small town about five kilometers east from the mistral capital. If the city even had a name, he didn't know it. Hid did knew that he was looking for a pub called flower in the swamp. He was going there because of a strange job offer that was given to him. He found the pub that he was looking for after a quite big walk. For an outside village, it was pretty big, and the place wasn't very famous or popular. It was small for a pub, but big for a mistral-styled house. It was a horrible place. It was in places like that where the best jobs were given. He entered the bar.

Right after going in, he already wanted to leave. The location smelled as a dead bull covered in excrements. There were about five men in the place; every single one looked either bored or vicious. And every single one was staring at him. He actually didn't care too much about that part. He had already gotten used to the stares. They were very common. After all, only 10 years had passed after the faunus war, and some humans still didn't liked faunus. Some humans still hated faunus. Some humans still hated his race.

His fox tail was ruffling, but he did his best efforts to hide it. His tail, differently from him, still didn't get used to the stares. He went directly to the bartender. She was a tall short-haired woman.

"Sorry, but I don't want any fights or confusions in my bar. Can you please leave?"

Blaine answered in an almost annoyed way. "kinda strange to call someone and ask for him to leave, don't you think?"

The woman realized what she just have done, and started instantly apologize "wait, you are the hunter? I'm really, really sorry, I ju-just thought…"

"That just because I am a faunus that means that I'm a troublemaker and an outlaw?" he completed. Some people thought that all faunus were violent, robbers fighters, that couldn't think rationally, people that couldn't do anything besides fight and kill. Sometimes, Blaine really wanted to confirm these rumors. "Enough chit-chat, why did you call a hunter? This doesn't looks like a grimm-filled area."

"Well," started the woman "there's this local gang. They call themselves the bloody claw. They ask for payment from us, and if anyone doesn't pay, they destroy everything from him."

Blackmailing a whole neighborhood to get taxes, huh. That was a very common crime, especially in Mistral."Well, that isn't a reason. I would help, but you know that hunters are made to fight grimm, not criminals." He said. Actually he could help anyways, but he wanted to know why she called a hunter, not just called the cops, or a common mercenary, as hunters usually are much more expensive.

"There's where the real problem is…" she started to say, when three armed men came, each one with a pistol and a knife in their belt. They inspect the bar with superior eyes, like if they owned the place and ruled over every single one of the customers.

"Barbara, my flower" said the man that seem to be the leader "how are you doing? We're fine, but could be better if you gave us another 200 bucks."

'Barbara' was clearly surprised by the sudden appearance of the collector. "You already came this week. You were supposed to only come once a month" said the woman.

"The boss needs more money for his stuff" he said in an annoyed tone that suggested that he already had to answer this question many times "but knowing why we need your money isn't your job. Your job is to give us any money that we ask." He, then, came closer to the barmaid and spoke in a very low voice, so that only the woman listened. However, thanks to his fox ears, Blaine could easily hear what he was saying. "Or, if you want, an ursa can 'mysteriously' invade your bar, and destroy it all. Don't worry, I can find a new workplace for you, maybe in a whorehouse? That would be a good place for you." He said with a sarcastic smile. After that, Barbara went pale as milk. "Well, in that case, pay the bill. Also, I and my friends would want three glasses of ale." He only then noticed Blaine's presence. "Oh, forget about the ale. If there's a faunus here, looks like this place is crap now. Since them you serve pieces of crap, Barbs?"

That was it. The man's lifespan just decreased about thirty years. "Since you first came here, I think." Answered the fox faunus.

Judging by the gangster's look, he wasn't used to hear answers. "I'm sorry; I think I didn't hear you well" he said in a menacing tone

"Oh, I'm sorry; I didn't know you were deaf. I thought your only problem was stupidly."

The man's face, then, acquired a dark and killer look "hey, don't you know who are you talking to, animal?"

Blaine pretended a 'thinking hard' look "I don't know. Three dumb gangsters that think that are important?" if it was possible, the criminal became even angrier.

"Looks like someone is being a smarty-pants. Well, I think we'll have to teach him a lesson, don't you think" he asked to his companions, who nodded happily, exited to beat up someone. "You're in big trouble, faunus" he said the word like it was some kind of disgusting thing "remember the name of Jonny Z when you go to hell!" he tried to give Blaine a punch in his head, but the hunter simply grabbed his hand.

"Let me say only one thing: our dear Miss Barbara here said that she didn't any fights or confusions on her bar. So, if you are willing to fight, let's do it outside" after saying this, he knocked the criminal who said to be called Jonny and threw him through the window. He too jumped through the window and landed on him. His friends came outside through the door and drew their pistols. Blaine almost laughed at their horrible mistake 'damm, I wanted to not use aura or my weapons. Well, if they use fancy guns, I can use my semblance.' Right before they would press the trigger, he just pointed at the guns, and they wouldn't work. The men didn't understand that and tried to shoot more times, which only gave time for him to get near them. He first punch the on the right and then gave a low kick on the on the left. He grabbed the first one and threw him on the other, before he could rise. He, them, walked slowly to Jonny, who was slowly rising to his feet, and kneed his chest, making him fall again. He then started interrogating him "you said that an ursa could 'appear' in the bar. What does that mean? Do you hold grimm in captivity?" he asked first. He simply spit at him "let me ask again:" he said lifting him by the collar and pressing him against the wall "Do you hold grimm in captivity?" he asked lifting his voice. The man started getting scared. Good.

"Yes, yes! My boss has a bunch. We wouldn't actually use them, my boss would never lend them to anybody, and we were just bluffing."

"And who is your dammed boss" said Blaine, trying to use the scariest voice tone he could.

"I-I really don't know. The highest above me is Mr. Dale. Booker Dale. I don't know who is above him."

"And where do I find this 'Booker Dale'?"

"There's a subway, Third Street going by the Emmer Avenue. There you can find a man called Dex. You say that you want to buy some beowolf's claws. He will show you the path to the booker's lair." He said almost panicking.

Blaine dropped him in the ground and started talking slowly. "You will be judged by the crimes of blackmailing, attempted murder, illegal grimm captivity, racism, and threats of killing, propriety destruction and prostitution. This should give you about 35 to 50 years in prison. You'll have a long time to think then, and will start with this teaching that I give to you: if you are a regular human like you, don't fight faunuses using your fists, don't fight aura-users and NEVER fight a hunter. You just did those three things, and realized what happens."

After calling the police to arrest the three men, he went back inside. Barbara was looking at him with anxious eyes, as if she was hoping for him to accept the job.

"Don't worry," he said "I accept the work. Whoever is behind those crimes, will be arrested before tomorrow morning" he said.

 **And there was the third chapter of the team SABR. First I want to apologize for the delay in the writing. I'll try to publish the fourth chapter before this Saturday, but if I don't, I will not publish it before the 20** **th** **, because I will be on vacation. Now with the notes and today's 'world-of-remnant-50-years-back'**

 **Notes:**

 ***I only realized that Blaine was basically a fusion of Blake and Fox (in physical appearance he is almost equal to Fox, but older and paler, and without the fully white eyes) after writing this chapter. I liked his design so much, that I didn't want to change him. I had a similar trouble with the old design of Andrew (who looked awfully like ruby), but in his case, I changed his design.**

 **And now, for today's discount world of remnant, chronology and culture.**

 **(We'll be using the initials MT for modern time, which means the time of the series.)**

 ***80 years before MT- the Great War**

 **-All kingdoms fought**

 **-After the war, the hunter academies were created.**

 ***65 years before MT- the faunus war**

 **\- The faunus got the same rights as the humans; however the discrimination of most of the population still exists**

 **-The White Fang was created. However, it still is a peaceful group. It will only become violent five years before MT, when its leadership is changed. Then, the white fang becomes an armed terrorist group.**

 ***50 years before MT – time in the fiction**

 **-The hunters are in their best moments, being recognized as the best warriors in the world.**

 **-After two wars, the military tech is very advanced, but the technology of the population is very bad. Think of the USSR in the end of the cold war: they had super advanced weapons but their population was starving.**

 *** MT – time in the series**

 **-I don't have much to talk here. Basically is the same as the show, but with slightly differences. I won't talk about them because that would be spoilers for my next RWBY fanfiction**

 **And that's it for today. Thanks for reading my fanfic and please write a review. See ya :)**


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